How A Fear of Commitment Keeps You Stuck

People struggle with commitment want the same thing that everyone else does- but do the things that prevent them from finding lasting love. Their fear and anxiety surrounding commitment cause them to feel paralyzed and unable to stay in the relationship – despite wanting to. Instead of working through their issues – they do the very thing that reinforces their fear – they run.

They experience love like the rest of us who are able to stay in a relationship but they cannot stay in the relationship. The feelings that most of us experience feel more scary and intense than they are for most people. These strong feelings drive the person to end the relationship.

There is no one type of person that has commitment issues – they differ. However, their commitment issues continue regardless of the time – few weeks, months, or years. At the end, they cannot stay committed and start to look for reasons now to stay in the relationship. Their deep rooted fears and anxiety around commitment rise up and bubble over until they do things that either drive the person away or convince themselves the person is ‘not the one.’

Commitment issues are nothing new and no doubt we all know someone who would meet the criteria for commitment fear. John Grohol, PsychCentral perfectly sum up some of the reasons that plagued people who cannot commit:

Fear of, or having had, the relationship end without notice or signs

Fear of not being in the “right” relationship

Fear of, or having been in, an unhealthy relationship (characterized by abandonment, infidelity, abuse, etc.)

Trust issues because of past hurts by those close to the person

Childhood trauma or abuse

Unmet childhood needs or attachment issues

Complicated family dynamics while growing up

John, 38. Has been in a relationship for about 2.5 years with Mandy. He has had 3 previous relationships, but as he tells it, they ended for legitimate reasons and not because of his fears (too young, drinking became an issue, changed jobs). However, this is the first time that John can say he is in love. He wishes he could stay in the relationship because Mandy is ‘a catch.’ John’s parents are divorced and his father had an affair. He is one of 5 siblings, and 3 of his siblings are divorced or going through a divorce. He doesn’t have a lot of faith in long-term relationships although he wants to be in one.

Steps to Overcome Commitment Issues:

Address his internal conflict. We have started to address his internal conflict of wanting the intimacy that comes with relationships, but also learning that’s its ok (and healthy) to cultivate his own identity and need for time alone.

Examine his black and white thinking. Much like his cognitive distortions, John looks at relationships as being ‘trapped’ or having ‘freedom’ – but relationships are neither. Relationships are more fluid and helping him recognize the need for greater communication.

Address his cognitive distortions. John feels he has to have the perfect relationship, be guaranteed that love will last and will not change, he shouldn’t want time away, and doesn’t feel he shouldn’t want to be with her.

Fear of communication. Like most people, John wasn’t taught healthy communication skills and as such has a tendency to keep things bottled up until he becomes overwhelmed. Fear of disappointment or believing that he has a right to how he feels (for example, wanting to spend time alone), prevents him from communicating how he feels. As a sidebar, Mandy would often say this and want him to be more communicative.

Sexual intimacy. In the beginning of the relationship, he felt more comfortable with sexual intimacy. However, as time has progressed, things have changed. John’s frustration around this is that he is the one that has backed off from sex more than Mandy and much of this has to do with not being able to communicate some of the things that Mandy does that bothers him. So, instead of addressing those issues, he feels there’s something wrong with him and thus the relationship.

Like most things in life, a fear of commitment can be overcome. However, you are the game changer in your life. You must decide if you want to make the change and then invest your time and emotional energy to overcome your fears and anxiety around relationships.

Rosie the Robot, Amazon, and the Future of RAAI

It’s tough to find a kid out there who hasn’t dreamed about robots. Long before artificial intelligence existed in the real world, the idea of a non-human entity that could act and think like a human has been rooted in our imaginations. According to Greek legends, Cadmus turned dragon teeth into soldiers, Hephaestus fabricated tables that could “walk” on their own three legs, and Talos, perhaps the original “Tin Man,” defended Crete. Of course, in our own times, modern storytellers have added hundreds of new examples to the mix. Many of us grew up watching Rosie the Robot on The Jetsons. As we got older, the stories got more sophisticated. “Hal” in 2001: A Space Odyssey was soon followed by R2-D2 and C-3PO in the original Star Wars trilogy. RoboCop, Interstellar, and Ex Machina are just a few of the recent additions to the list.

Maybe it’s because these stories are such a part of our culture that few people realize just how far robotics has advanced today—and that artificial intelligence is anything but a futuristic fantasy. Ask anyone outside the industry how modern-day robots and artificial intelligence (AI) are used in the real world, and the answers are usually pretty generic. Surgical robots. Self-driving cars. Amazon’s Alexa. What remains a mystery to most is the immense and fast-growing role the combination of robotics automation and artificial intelligence, or RAAI (pronounced “ray”), plays in nearly every aspect of our everyday lives.

Today, shopping online is something most of us take for granted, and yet eCommerce is still in its relative infancy. Despite double-digit growth in the past four years, only 8% of total retail spending is currently done online. That number is growing every day. Business headlines in July announced that Amazon was on a hiring spree to add another 50K fulfillment employees to its already massive workforce. While that certainly reflects the shift from brick-and-mortar to web-based retail, it doesn’t even begin to tell the story of what this growth means for the technology and application firms that deliver the RAAI tools required to support the momentum of eCommerce. In 2017, only 5% of the warehouses that fuel eCommerce are even partially automated. This means that to keep up with demand, the application of RAAI will have to accelerate—and fast. In fact, RAAI is a key driver of success for top e-retailers like Amazon,Apple, and Wal-Mart as they strive to meet the explosion in online sales.

From an investor’s perspective, this fast-growing demand for robotics, automation and artificial intelligence is a promising opportunity—especially in logistics automation that includes the tools and technologies that drive efficiencies across complex retail supply chains. Considering the fact that four of the top ten supply chain automation players were acquired in the past three years, it’s clear that the industry is transforming rapidly. Amazon’s introduction of Prime delivery (which itself requires incredibly sophisticated logistics operations) was only made possible by its 2012 acquisition of Kiva Systems, the pioneer of autonomous mobile robots for warehouses and supply chains. Amazon recently upped the ante yet again with its recent acquisition of Whole Foods Market, which not only adds 450 warehouses to its immense logistics network, but is also expected to be a game-changer for the online grocery retail industry.

Clearly Amazon isn’t the only major driver of innovation in logistics automation. It’s just the largest, at least for the moment. It’s no wonder that many RAAI companies have outperformed the S&P500 in the past three years. And while some investors have worried that the RAAI movement is at risk of creating its own tech bubble, the growth of eCommerce is showing no signs of reaching a peak. In fact, if the online retail industry comes even close to achieving the growth predicted—of doubling to an amazing $4trillion by 2020—it’s likely that logistics automation is still in the early stages of adoption. For best-of-breed players in every area of logistics automation, from equipment, software, and services to supply chain automation technology providers, the potential for growth is tremendous.

How can investors take advantage of the growth in robotics, automation, and artificial intelligence?

One simple way to track the performance of these markets is through the ROBO Global Robotics & Automation Index. The logistics subsector currently accounts for around 9% of the index and is the best performing subsector since its inception. The index includes leading players in every area of RAAI, including material handling systems, automated storage and retrieval systems, enterprise asset intelligence, and supply chain management software across a wide range of geographies and market capitalizations. Our index is research based and we apply quality filters to identify the best high growth companies that enable this infrastructure and technology that is driving the revolution in the retail and distribution world.

When I was a kid, I may have dreamed of having a Rosie the Robot of my own to help do my chores, but I certainly had no idea how her 21st century successors would revolutionize how we shop, where we shop, and even how we receive what we buy - often via delivery to our doorstep on the very same day. Of course, the use of RAAI is by no means limited to eCommerce. It’s driving transformative change in nearly every industry. But when it comes to enabling the logistics automation required to support a level of growth rarely seen in any industry, RAAI has a lot of legs to stand on—even if those “legs” are anything but human.

The ROBO Global® Robotics and Automation Index and the ROBO Global® Robotics and Automation UCITS Index (the “Indices”) are the property of ROBO who have contracted with Solactive AG to calculate and maintain the Indices. Past performance of an index is not a guarantee of future results. It is not intended that anything stated above should be construed as an offer or invitation to buy or sell any investment in any Investment Fund or other investment vehicle referred to in this website, or for potential investors to engage in any investment activity.